EU Affairs

The Political
Fight Against TB

Political
pressure is growing on the European Union and national governments to increase
resources in the fight against tuberculosis as new research reveals that 55
people are diagnosed with the disease every hour in Europe.

A cross-party
group of members of the European Parliament has tabled a written declaration calling
on the European Commission and Member States to take a leading role in
coordinating the control of TB. They are looking for sufficient resources to be
allocated from the EU’s multiannual research programme, its Innovative
Medicines Initiative and the European Research Council to promote research into
multi or extensively drug resistant TB (MDR/XDR). This would mean increasing
existing EU spending on TB research from the current €20
million to €100 million.

The call for
greater funding is being voiced even more strongly by Médecins Sans Frontières.
Dr Tido von Schoen-Angerer, the director of MSF’s campaign for access to
essential medicines, estimates that globally some €1.45
billion needs to be spent on TB research and development, of which the EU share
should be over €400 million annually.
“We desperately need new vaccines, drugs and diagnostics for TB. This will only
happen with more research. Countries right on Europe’s doorstep – and even
within the European Union – are struggling against resistant strains of the
disease. But research budgets remain pitifully low. Tuberculosis is knocking
loudly on the door, but the European Commission is playing deaf,” he said.

The MEPs are also
advocating that illegal immigrants entering Europe and suffering from the
disease should have proper access to, and possibility of completing, the
necessary treatment, which for non-drug resistant cases can last as long as
eight months.

The call for a
higher political priority to be attached to tackling TB, especially the
multidrug resistant kind, coincides with publication at the end of March by the
World Health Organisation and the Stockholm-based European Centre for Disease
Prevention and Control of their first joint Tuberculosis Surveillance Report on
the scale of the disease. According to the new data, there were 477,327 TB
cases in Europe in 2007 – the equivalent of 55 every hour. More worryingly, about
43,600 cases are suspected of being multidrug resistant.

The new data
confirm that most European countries are continuing to experience a steady
decrease in overall TB notification, but wide differences remain with just five
new TB cases per 100,000 population in Iceland, but over 100 per 100,000 in
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova and Romania.

Commenting on
the findings, the ECDC’s Director, Zsuzsanna Jakab, said: “Although the overall
number of TB cases being reported in the European Union has declined slightly,
the proportion of MDR-TB being found is cause for concern. More attention needs
to be paid to ensure early diagnosis and treatment, as well as equity of access
to treatment for vulnerable populations.”

Dr Nata
Menabde, WHO’s deputy regional director for Europe, reminded the 53 WHO
European member states of their commitment in Berlin two years ago to provide
more political support and resources to control TB. “Health systems face
serious challenges in responding to TB and achieving Millennium Development
Goal 6: to have halted and begun to reverse the incidence of TB by 2015. We
have to make significant efforts if this Goal is to be met,” she said.

It is not just
governments and international and non-governmental organisations that are active
in the fight against TB. Private companies are also lending their support. In
2003, the American pharmaceutical manufacturer, Eli Lilly created the Lilly
MDR-TB Partnership. The public-private initiative has 18 partners, ranging from
the International Hospital Federation to the World Economic Forum. It provides access
to medicines, transfers manufacturing technology of Eli Lilly’s two antibiotics
for MDR-TB (capreomycin and cycloserine) to the developing world, trains
healthcare workers, raises awareness and promotes prevention and research.
While present in over 60 countries, the Partnership is particularly active in
India, South Africa, China and Russia, which have particularly high incidences
of TB.

The European
Commission is also looking to boost efforts to tackle TB. At the end of June, it
will jointly organise a meeting in Luxembourg with the WHO and the ECDC
gathering together health ministries, national TB managers and civil society to
consider new ways to combat the disease.

Following
publication last year of the Framework Action Plan to fight Tuberculosis in the
EU, the Commission is helping to build new partnerships between European
scientists, industrial partners and researchers from endemic countries. One
example is the European and Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership
which helps test new drugs and vaccines for poverty related and other neglected
diseases.

The Political
Fight Against TB<br>
Political
pressure is growing on the European Union and national governments to increase
resources in the fight agains

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